And Now for Someone Completely Different

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You've beaten the first couple of major bosses, you've leveled up, gotten some new powers, and your character has gone from pathetic to useful. A big, epic, climactic scene is occurring. Then the scene ends in a Cliffhanger and you have to start with a brand new character in a somewhat related storyline. Prepare to do this several times for The Rashomon-style storyline to be completed.

If you're lucky, all the characters will meet and party up for payoff later. If not and the story never goes back to the original character then they may have been the Decoy Protagonist.

If the game is an RPG and the new character has to start all the way back at level 1 this can be somewhat annoying as it means that you will have to Level Grind to get them back to being useful. Some RPGs may start the new character off at a higher level to prevent this problem.

A sister trope to this one is Another Side, Another Story, where the player goes through one character's story without changing between scenes but has the option of switching to the other character's story at any time (or after unlocking it) usually from the main menu.

Video-Game Examples:

Action

This is what happens to Yasha from Asura's Wrath. At least for 3 episodes, 1 DLC episode, part of episode 17 and episode 20 in the Part IV Nirvana DLC.

In The Force Unleashed, the first level is played as Darth Vader, but afterwards the focus switches to his apprentice. As with MGS2, this may be one example where people might actually wish that they could play as the prologue character for longer. Unlike MGS2 however, the actual protagonist was heavily advertised beforehand.

Heavenly Sword has players controlling Kai for a few brief portions rather than Nuriko.

The video game adaptation of Spider-Man 3 has the player controlling Harry Osborn for a bit during the final battle.

You could also play as Harry as the second Green Goblin in the first movie tie-in game in what was the same story levels but a new story.

Star Wars Rogue Squadron Across all 3 games you will be switching out pilots on a regular basis. The first RS has you play as Luke Skywalker almost the entire game, with the exception of the Battle of Calamari, where you play as Wedge Antilles. Rogue Leader has the most pilot changes, with the first three missions playing as Luke, until a mid-mission switch to Wedge, who you play as for the rest of the regular missions. You do play as Luke in a couple of bonus missions, as well as Darth Vader in the alternate reality missions. You also get to play as Han Solo in one bonus mission, and if you use the Millennium Falcon in the "Strike at the Core" mission, you get to play as Lando Calrissian. Rebel Strike has an equal number of missions for Luke and Wedge, in addition to one mission as Arvel Crynyd ("Green Leader"), the pilot who crashed his A-Wing into the SSD Executor's bridge in Episode VI. Granted, all of the ships handle exactly the same regardless of who you're playing; it's just the knowledge of who's piloting your ship.

The Mission Impossible (1997) video game on the Nintendo 64 and Playstation has one level where you take control of two snipers to protect Ethan Hunt from assassins.

Terminator: Dawn of Fate has three playable characters that usually has a weapon or two unique to each.

After beating Hotline Miami, you get one last set of chapters as The Biker, a Boss you defeated in the chapter 'Neighbors'.

Action Adventure

The Last of Us has two instances of this. The prologue of the game has you play as Joel's daughter while the perspective shifts between Ellie and Joel in the Winter chapters.

It goes one further and has Jim Gordon, Hush, Officer Owens and Joker playable in specific parts of the story as well as Batgirl and Red Hood in DLC, bringing the total number of playable characters to twelve.

Cubivore: Your character goes through several reincarnations, where they see the benefit of their work in previous lives.

Fahrenheit has you jump from character to character, but never permanently. For an added kick, the primary protagonist Lucas is a wanted fugitive, whereas the other two are cops in charge of capturing him.

Likewise, its Spiritual SuccessorHeavy Rain switches between the four main characters frequently, sometimes in the middle of a chapter. Additionally, in two chapters you also get to control a young version of the Origami Killer in Flashback.

Folklore has two player-controlled characters, Ellen and Keats, whose stories unfold concurrently. The player has some choice in whether to alternate between the two or to play through several chapters with one before switching to the other, but either way, each one's abilities and collected items don't transfer to the other.

Legacy of Kain: Defiance alternates between Kain and Raziel as the playable character. This gets weird when the two of them end up fighting each other.

In Onimusha 3: Demon Siege the player primarily controls swordsman Samanosuke and policeman Jacques. Roughly in the middle of the game they also briefly control Jacques' fiancee Michelle.

This is a main characteristic of Spider-Man: Shattered Dimensions, where you play as four different incarnations of Spidey and must switch among them between levels.

The beginning of Star Fox Adventures has you controlling Krystal for a brief bit, before you control the real main character, Fox McCloud.

Subverted in Uncharted 3: Drake's Deception. After one level of Nathan Drake getting beaten up in an English pub ala previous games, the second level switches to a kid in South America... but it doesn't take long for the savvy players to notice the Fashionable Asymmetry or Catch-Phrase and realise they're now playing as young Nate.

Played straight in Uncharted 4: A Thief's End. Chapter 5 has you control Nate's brother Sam during his alleged prison breakout. Happens again in the epilogue, where you control Nate and Elena's teenage daughter Cassie.

This was one of the more openly touted features in Leisure Suit Larry 3: Passionate Patti in Pursuit of the Pulsating Pectorals: The player takes the role of Larry in the first part of the game, where he searched for new sexual conquests as usual, and then switches to Passionate Patti in the second part, where she tries to hunt down Larry and his buff, polyester-clad pecks. This mechanic returned in Leisure Suit Larry 5: Passionate Patti Does a Little Undercover Work, where Patti assumes the role of an undercover spy in the music industry, and the game takes turns swapping the player's focus back and forth between Larry and Patti.

Gabriel Knight 2: The Beast Within switched between Gabriel and Grace.

Unrest features five main characters, whom you switch between with each chapter. With the various factions and intrigues at play, choices made by one are likely to impact the lives of others.

Environmental Narrative Games

A major part of What Remains of Edith Finch. The game is spent seeking out flashback sequences, each of which has you play, still from a first-person perspective, a different member of the Finch family on the day of their death.

Fighting Games

The Story mode of Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha A's Portable : The Gears of Destiny does this, with each chapter following a different set of characters from the ones before it until the final one, which allows the player to choose which character from nearly the entire playable cast to fight the Final Boss with. It then switches back to this for the Playable Epilogue, with the player controlling the Final Boss herself.

Super Smash Bros. Brawl does this in the Adventure Mode, where you switch between various groups between levels, until the gang comes together for the grand finale. Unlike the previous examples, levels aren't much of an issue, but you still lose out on sticker bonuses that you applied to the characters. And if they just became playable, you can't use stickers on them until you finish the level, and of course you need to get familiar with the character as well. However, it can be said that the purpose of this is so you get used to the different characters and know which ones you're good with. This counteracts the possibility of people just saying "Hey, I liked this guy's game! I'll use him!" even if it's a crappy character.

A subversion in Konquest mode of Mortal Kombat: Deception. You play as Shujinko throughout the game, but depending on who he trained with, you will participate in fights as a physical manifestation of that character. Basically, it's Shujinko fighting exactly like that character he trained with.

Same city as the last game, although it's some years after, and yet there are entirely new characters, new bad guys, and a new protagonist.

While Delta is trapped by Sofia, you get to control a Little Sister as she harvests ADAM and collects the pieces of the Big Sister suit for Eleanor.

Call of Juarez was built around this shtick; alternating between the stealthy Billy and the heavily armed Reverend Ray in a game of cat and mouse where you play both feline and rodent. Generally, you'd play most levels twice: Once, sneaking around the area avoiding detection from bandits and the like, and then again while blowing away everyone. While quoting Bible verse.

This is commonplace in the Call of Duty games. You'll often switch viewpoints between characters fighting on different parts of the world. Considering the series (especially the Modern Warfare games) often pulls the "Anyone Can Die" trick on you, some of them may not last long.

An interesting example in Call of Duty: Black Ops II. If Karma gets captured, you can rescue her in one strike force mission called Second Chance. If you save her, you can play as her during the mission. Unlike the strike force soldiers, don't expect a respawn to save you though.

Another to note: The Zombie games in World At War, Black Ops, and Black Ops 2 has a habit with pitting you with at least one totally different group of characters, either canonically or non-sensibly, such as the generic US soldiers to the four unique characters, to the executives (JFK being one), to famous action actors, etc.

Win Back 2 has you play each mission from two different characters' points of view.

Tends to happen in the Halo games. Halo 2 began the trend with the Arbiter missions intercut with the Master Chief's; Halo 3 featured the Chief as the solo playable character, but co-op players take control of the Arbiter and two other Elites. Halo 3: ODST threw the Chief to the wind and played as a heretofore-unseen trooper team, and Halo: Reach rounded it off with the player character being simply another Spartan. By the time the series got to Halo 4, it could be argued that Master Chief was someone completely different by that point.

The final chapter in Killzone: Shadowfall is the only one played from the perspective of someone other than Keller: Echo, out to avenge Kellers' death by assassinating the man that did it. It also marks the first time in the franchise where you play as a Helghast.

Hack and Slash

Chaos Legion has one stage playable for Arcia Rinslet, the gun-toting young girl that Sieg befriended earlier. She can't summon Legions but can use super-charged shots in place of that. However, an unlockable feature is to play as her in all stages (though she lacks a majority of the cutscenes).

Devil May Cry 4 puts you in the shoes of newcomer Nero for the first ten Missions, after which series lead Dante takes over until Mission 18, when you're back with Nero through to the end of the game. Lucky for the player, though, all Proud Souls (the currency used for leveling up abilities) gathered as Nero transfer to Dante, as do vitality levels and Devil Trigger orbs, and Nero gets a metric shitton of Proud Souls when you switch back to him.

Special Edition adds two other campaigns alongside Nero and Dante's story from the original game, that allow you to play as either Vergil for the full game, or Lady for Nero's levels and Trish for Dante's levels.

Bayonetta 1's epilogue has you play as Jeanne for a while, as she ascends the statue of Jubileus in a bid to rescue the captive Bayonetta. In the same chapter, providing an odd twist, you take control of Jubileus' soul as it hurtles towards the sun, you having to guide it past the planets in the Solar System.

In the Chapter before that in the battle against the Masked Lumen, just before the Sage's health hits zero, you start playing as Madama Butterfly as she does battle with the Sage's Temperantia.

And finally, in the final chapter, doubling as a Call-Back, you briefly take control of Loptr's body as it flies towards the open maw of Gomorrah. Unlike the last game, there's no way that Loptr can escape his well-deserved doom, making this double as Controllable Helplessness.

Platformers

At one point in Mischief Makers, you must play as Teran instead of Marina. Teran has dramatically different abilities and controls.

The Pinocchio video game has players controlling the puppet for most of the game, but the second level actually has them taking control of Jiminy Cricket.

In the indie game Psychosomnium, whenever you die in sight of another NPC, you gain control of that NPC. Serves for a few interesting twists.

Like Ratchet and Clank, it's commonplace in the Sly Cooper series. In fact, it's not only always used, but also used more and more with each installment.

In the original, you mainly played as Sly but there were a few levels where you controlled Murray driving the van.

In the first sequel, Murray and Bentley are both playable characters, it stars using the practice of switching characters within story missions (for example, you may start one mission as Sly and then after a certain point automatically switch to Bentley).

In the third game, you not only had the main trio but five other playable characters as well.

And the fourth game looks to be following this pattern with the inclusion of Sly's ancestors.

The Ratchet & Clank series is another trope where this is commonplace. In nearly every game the player mainly controls Ratchet, but at times must directly take control of Clank for various reasons (for example, in the first game at one point there's a planet with a hazardous atmosphere so only Clank can head out on his own while Ratchet must stay behind). The spin off Secret Agent Clank inverts this: Clank is the one played as for the majority of the game while Ratchet is the one the player briefly controls at various points.

Sonic Adventure 2 features two intertwining storylines in Hero and Dark; hero has the players switching between Sonic, Knuckles, and Tails, while Dark has them using Eggman, Shadow, and Rouge. All six characters are used in the final ending.

Sonic the Hedgehog (2006) has three main storyarcs for Sonic, Shadow, and Silver, though other supporting cast members in the Sonic series will briefly take over as minor playable characters during each story (Tails and Knuckles for Sonic; Rouge and Omega for Shadow, and Amy and Blaze for Silver). Sometimes even one of the main three characters will be playable in another character's story mode: for example, in Sonic's story the player briefly controls Silver at one point.

Sonic Riders Zero Gravity, like Sonic Adventure 2, has two intertwining storylines- the heros and the Babylon Rogues. The heroes team has (again) Sonic, Tails, and Knuckles, while the Babylong Rogues team has Jet, Wave and Storm. Amy gets a level for herself- though, oddly, her level is in the middle of the Babylon Rogues' story, even though she spends most of her time with the Hero team. And her objective is to outrace a computer-controlled Babylon Rogue.

Deadly Rooms of Death Very easy to implement in the level editor, and they occasionally appear in the main level sets.

Portal 2 has this for community created puzzle maps made by players via Steam Workshop. In single player mode, you play as Chell. In co-op, you play as a robot (Atlas or P-body). When you play a community created map, you play as... one of the stick figures from the Aperture videos. The character in question had no name for a while until a patch release notes dubbed him as Bendy.

Real Time Strategy

Starcraft's campaigns follow a logical story and difficulty order, but the first few Zerg and Protoss levels spoon-feed the new base and unit concepts.

Subverted in Total Annihilation : Kingdoms, which caused this to be viewed by some people as a negative trait, in spite of the fact that you are learning all four factions equally.

Warcraft III does this several times, sometimes multiple per section. The most aggravating uses the same character, combining this trope with Bag of Spilling, in the change between the Human and Undead campaign. There Arthas goes from a max-level character with a collection of powerful artifacts and an Infinity +1 Sword to a level one character with a healing potion. He also loses the effect of the sword, despite it being a very important plot point that he is still using it.

Rhythm Games

In Rhythm Thief & the Emperor's Treasure, while you'll use Raphael/Phantom R most of the time, you will occasionally control Fondue, Marie, Charlie, or Vergier. Each of them also receives a bonus chapter starring them, with Charlie and Vergier sharing one.

Role Playing Games

Betrayal at Krondor: This happens a few times, actually, but the most egregious is the beginning of Chapter 5, when you lose Owyn for the first time and instead get Patrus, whose stats are...well, he's a very old man.

Then again, as the story switches back and forth between the two groups, you don't really lose anyone for long.

Ryu tours through two city-dungeons on his local continent before arriving at Winlan where the game switches over to Nina, who is at a much lower level, as she goes off on a quest unrelated to the Dark Dragons. And then you have to save her.

Later on in the same game, you switch to greedy fish-merchant Gobi after the heroes are stranded on a desert island; he's the only one who can venture underwater and pick up the MacGuffin needed to escape.

Chrono Trigger: Right up until 2/3 of the way through the game, Crono is a forced party member and therefore your highest level character. Oh, and he has the most powerful spell in the game. Then he dies and you're forced to continue on as someone else, with Marle and Lucca taking up the role of protagonist. You lose his armour and accessory too, by the way. Luckily, you can get Crono back eventually.

Chrono Cross does this with both main character and party members, but in an unusual way. Your antagonist body-swaps you. Your old party members stay behind with "Serge" and you're forced to recruit and equip a new party as Lynx.

Cosmic Fantasy 2 for the PC-Engine / Turbo Duo starts out with Van, but after he is sent forward in time by the main villain, the game switches to Babbette, a member of the Cosmic Hunters. The change causes a brief difficulty spike because Babbette starts out at Level 1 and is very poorly equipped. After meeting a second character and dealing with a fairly tough dungeon and boss, the focus changes back over to Van, who ends up rescuing an imprisoned Babbette.

Dark Cloud 2 begins with Monica's first fight, within her castle, before confronting Gaspard and following him back in time. After that, you'll play as Max for the entire first dungeon, and meet Monica on the way to Sindain.

Since the party is broken up frequently in CIMA: The Enemy, the player often takes control of either Ivy or one of the combat-capable settlers.

In Dragon Ball Z: The Legacy of Goku 2 and Buu's Fury, you change between characters constantly. There are doors that only certain characters above level X can open. And you have to level ALL of them separately.

Dubloon temporarily switches point of view to Riley and his monkey Ricky when Russel and Anne leave Outcast Island, until they cross paths with each other.

Dragon Quest IV started this all the way back on the original Famicom. You went through 4 chapters, each focusing around different characters before you got to control the main hero.note The DS remake added a prologue where you played as The Hero.

The remakes of Final Fantasy II adds in a post-game episode, Soul of Rebirth where Minwu is the main protagonist, taking place right after he dies.

Partially used in Final Fantasy IV, when Cecil changes class. On the way back down the mountain, the same monsters that provided meager returns now cause the new Cecil to level up rather quickly. Cecil's old equipment is useless at this point, but there's an opportunity for "Reversed 'So Long, and Thanks for All the Gear'" if you happened to buy the unusable equipment at the earlier town.

There's also a brief scripted boss battle where the player controls Edward rather than Cecil.

Final Fantasy V has a moment where Bartz, Lenna, and Faris are all taken hostage, and Galuf must fight solo to free them all

Due to its ensemble nature, Final Fantasy VI doesn't have one locked protagonist and you can pretty much just have your favorite characters form a party. You start out with Terra, but then she falls unconscious and you control Locke. Then you use the both of them and get Edgar and Sabin. Then the characters are split up and you switch between their own viewpoints. Once they reunite eventually you just have to use Locke and Celes at one point with two party members of your choice, and then after the next couple dungeons you can use anyone. Then you automatically have just Terra and Locke again, and then its back to your choice. And then the WHAM Episode comes and you're left with just Celes and have you get your party members back. After you get more than four you can then start switching out anyone you want for the rest of the game

Final Fantasy VII has a moment on Disc 2 where Cloud is temporarily out of commission, so the player controls first Tifa and then Cid.

Final Fantasy VIII does this multiple times where it switches out control of Squall for someone else. Late on Disc one you switch perspectives to the trio of Quistis, Zell, and Selphie. On Disc 2 you start out with the protagonists in prison and the entire missions switches between the viewpoints of Zell, Squall, and Irvine. Then right after this there's a mission where you control a party lead by Selphie. On Disc 3, there's a mission where you have Zell lead a party while Squall is currently in outer space.

These are more cases of Missing Main Character. A better example would be the times spent living the events of the past as Laguna and Company.

Final Fantasy IX also has several times where control is switched from Zidane to someone else. After the introduction, you actually start the game out playing as Vivi before regaining use of Zidane. Later on in the disc, the viewpoints split between the parties of Zidane, Vivi, and Freya, and Dagger, Steiner, and Marcus, and the game switches between the two all the way up to about 1/3 of Disc 2. Disc 2 also notably has a mission where Dagger becomes the main character even while Zidane is still in the party. Disc 3 again starts out with the player controlling Vivi, and later on your party splits up and Eiko is the default character to lead the Desert Palace group, if you included her as you're expected to do (if she isn't included, the order of command goes Steiner, Vivi, and then Freya, in that order.)

Final Fantasy X features a brief moment where the player controls Yuna rather than Tidus.

Final Fantasy X-2 actually starts the game out with the player controlling Rikku rather than Yuna, with Yuna actually acting as a boss. Turns out it's an imposter and the real Yuna is currently waiting on the sidelines.

In Final Fantasy XII the player starts off controlling a character called Reks. However Reks's involvement is little more than a tutorial and it doesn't take long before you're given control of the real viewpoint character, Vaan.

Final Fantasy XIII spends the whole first half of the game party switching; the first 2 chapters are the most jarring, but since you don't have many accessories at the time, it's not exactly a loss. After Chapter 3, this trope is zig-zagged; characters develop as you use them (frequently, you're stuck with parties of 2, so there's no choice in who you use); when you eventually reach the point where you have the entire party at your disposal, most characters' abilities overlap (e.g. five of your six characters will have the Ravager Role, four of six with have Commando, etc), so its up to you who you use and what roles they focus on (they all become unlocked at this point).

In Dissidia: Final Fantasy you play as the mains from I to X and a bit of XI and XII to unlock in separate character storylines. However, characters make appearances in each others' storylines, and you end up all together at the climax. The Museum section allows you to see a video of the whole story in chronological order

The Sacred Stones has a single bonus chapter where the player controls Ephraim's group briefly.

Radiant Dawn uses this, where the player will bounce between the Dawn Brigade/Daein Army, the Greil Mercenaries and the Crimean Royal Knights (the last 2 later get lumped together). It actually makes the game somewhat unique compared to the others, and allows a Let's Split Up, Gang near the end.

Front Mission 4, which bounces the story back and forth between Venezuela and Europe seemingly at random (though the prospect of something major happening in one branch can facilitate the switch... but mostly it's random).

Although the switch takes place during the break between the two games, the two games are still two halves of the same story and thus still count: In the first Golden Sun, you play as Isaac, Garet, Ivan, and Mia, on a quest to stop Saturos and Menardi's attempts to light the lighthouses. In Golden Sun: The Lost Age, the sequel, control switches over to Felix, Saturos and Menardi's right-hand man and Isaac and Garet's former friend, and you continue the quest to light the lighthouses for far nobler reasons than Saturos and Menardi indicated. Once they discover this fact, Isaac's group ends up joining forces with Felix's.

In Grandia II, you take control of Roan in the epilogue as he visits each of his old friends three years after everyone had already parted ways, after having played as Ryudo for the entire main story.

During Grandia III, you take control of Alfina alone inside her subconscious, after she passes out in the real world following Seiba's demise, in order to explore the events leading her brother Emelious to betray her many years ago.

Growlanser: Heritage of War is extremely guilty of this trope. It does it not only once but 4-5 times before you get on the main character's story. Although the actions you do with each characters will affect the main story line.

Kingdom Hearts II: The player spends the first few hours of the game controlling Roxas before resuming control as Sora from the first game. All of Roxas' stats are transferred to Sora after the switch. Additionally, during the final boss battle, the player character briefly switches to Riku after Sora is grabbed and starts having his energy drained by Xemnas.

Knights of the Old Republic set the precedent: Your Player Character, Bastila and Carth are captured by the Sith, and you have to choose one of your party members to bail you out. Not so difficult with Canderous, Juhani, or the droids, as they get to keep their gear. But for a challenge and a good laugh, pick Jolee or Mission.

The Game ModBrotherhood of Shadow also has frequent moments of this as you play through several Nintendo Hard flashbacks as Channa Mae.

In Jade Empire, this is limited to a few brief segments, notably two where you command Black Whirlwind and your choice of Dawn Star or Silk Fox during the siege of Dirge. There's also a less obvious instance where you have the option of playing as Black Whirlwind fighting in the arena against his brother.

Dragon Age: Origins has this as an option for a sequence in Denerim. You get to choose which two party members come for you. Also, during the Final Battle, you briefly control the party members whom you left at the Denerim gates (i.e. did not put into the active Player Party for the final push), as they Hold the Line against the encroaching Darkspawn.

Mass Effect 2 does this shockingly near the end, where Shepard and his/her crew leave the Normandy in the shuttle, and in their absence the Collectors invade. You're suddenly and jarringly given control of Joker, who must limp around the ship activating the AI to get the Normandy out of trouble.

During the climax of Mass Effect: Andromeda after Archon serves Ryder's connection to SAM the player takes control of their opposite-sex twin as they have to re-establish the connection onboard the Hyperion while it's under Kett attack.

The game starts with you controlling T3-M4 to repair Ebon Hawk, before you are allowed to play as the Exile for the first time.

There are also two segments where you control a team of party members (two and three, respectively) while the Exile is occupied elsewhere. Thankfully, you get to pick them yourself, and the second time, on Dxun, comes with plenty of warning and an option to pause and prepare better.

On the other hand, the fight between Atton and the Twin Suns in the Nar Shaddaa cantina comes out of the blue and you will be in trouble if you ignored Atton up to this point and gave your best equipment to other party members.

A particularly egregrious case is the Remote's solo mission on Malachor. The thing is level 1, cannot level up, has laughable weaponry and hit points. You can make it easy by first clearing the area, as the main character walks through it first (alone) and can easily handle all its dangers. If you just rushed through it to the area exit while ignoring the monsters, though... well, at least you'll know better on second playthrough!

The sequence where Mira fights with Hanharr also counts. She's not yet part of the team so you hadn't had a chance to develop and prepare her. Fortunately, she has access to the group's shared inventory, so depending on what sort of weapons and grenades you have that you did NOT already put on existing crewmembers, that fight can be really easy, or very problematic... There's also the fact that Mira can be cross-classed into Jedi after she joins your party, so some players may want to save her levels during her fight against Hanharr so she could gain more levels as a Jedi later on, thus makes the fight more difficult.

It only switches to Noa, who has an indestructible (for story purposes) partner before switching back to Vahn, and the two of them unite for the game's first boss. Gala just joins them both at Lv 1, no split required.

Live A Live, which was the entire point of the game - seven completely unrelated stories happening in different time periods. It all comes together in the end of course. And it turns out the stories weren't completely unrelated.

The party is captured and Paula psychically calls another one of the destined heroes to bust you out. He starts out at level one, so he'll need to do some Level Grinding first.

Also happens after Ness eats a magic cake, causing another character to show up.

MOTHER 3 does this multiple times. The prologue starts as Lucas, the hero. Then the first chapter has you play through the game as Flint, Lucas' father, up until the first "big" boss. He's joined about halfway through by Duster. The second chapter has you playing as Duster by himself, later joined by his father, Wess, and Rebellious Princess Kumatora. The next chapter switches focus entirely to a monkey named Salsa (though the chapter itself primarily serves to introduce QuirkyMiniboss Fassad). Then, finally, in the fourth chapter, the game switches to Lucas again, and only shifts once more to you, after you watch the effects of the Dark Dragon's awakening unfold, to speak to most of the game's main cast for a bit before the credits roll.

In Cognitive Dissonance, you initially take control of Giegue from right after he and his forces abandoned Earth in Earthbound Beginnings, before shifting to first protagonist Alivinar and the events kickstarting his mission.

Odin Sphere does this, as all five of the main characters are part of the same chain of events. After clearing one character's story, you move on to the next character, and so on. For the final confrontation, you then decide which characters fight the final bosses, and selecting them in the correct order is the only way to achieve the best ending. Sadly, selecting them in the wrong order on multiple runs is also the only way to get 100% Completion to earn the true ending, which is uplifting enough to endure the bad endings.

A prevalent trope in the first two Paper Mario games, taking place in between each major chapter. The first and second games had you control Peach in captivity, and the second also had you control Bowser who was on a mission of his own.

Not as pronounced in Super Paper Mario. In the game, after completing the first chapter, you play a short segment as Peach wandering through The Very Definitely Final Dungeon with a Koopa Troopa by her side and no enemies to fight. After Chapter Two, it's the same thing again, except you're playing as Luigi and accompanying you are two Goombas. After that, there's no more of these sequences. Two things of note:

Bowser does not get a similar scene.

While Peach fully retains her parasol ablities in her segment, Luigi cannot perform his high jump in his.

Phantasy Star III, which features multiple generations of the same family as lead characters. Interestingly, Mieu and Wren, who are cyborgs, retain their levels throughout all three generations.

Also made a bit more palatable as you tend to start each generation slightly more badass than the previous one. Take that, dad!

The Reconstruction features a minor example — after the prologue, where you play as Captain Rehm Sikohlon, the story Time Skips and switches perspectives to the real cast. And stays there.

Every game in the SaGa series after the Game BoyFinal Fantasy Legend games. Special mention goes to Saga Frontier 2 which is the king of this trope: not only do you have characters who are playable for only one dungeon, one character is actually "playable" only for one cutscene, meaning you never get to do anything with him, and he doesn't even count as having ever been in your party unless you go to the trade city immediately afterwards. At least skills learned are learned for every character in the game, and with no stages after the one you are currently on, there is no reason you'd even want to grind to begin with. This is also a game that will jump years and even generations into the future without warning, and inconsistently at that, since you're following two families separately. Makes your brain hurt, and one can only imagine how far the time gap between them can be pushed.

Happens multiple times in Sailor Moon: Another Story. This is because each of the Inner Senshi—Mercury, Venus, Mars, and Jupiter—as well as Chibi-Moon have their own plotlines that they follow, in Chapter 2 of the game. All your characters also start off at level 1 (except Sailor Pluto, who you encounter well into the game), so you'll have to control how you level up if you want to try to level them up evenly.

The Suikoden series is fond of player character changes. Suikoden II and Suikoden V both had sections where you created 3 different teams of characters to complete a section, and there was a small section of the original where you played a lone Dragon Knight.

Suikoden III, in which you get to see a single story unfold from the perspective of up to six different characters (three of which had to be unlocked via certain game events and the last of them being the Big Bad).

Treasure of the Rudra has an interesting variant in that you can switch from one character's story to another's at the drop of a hat.

Vandal Hearts I & II have small scale versions. In the first, several of your party members are thrown in prison and you assume control of The Stoic Clint. In the second, the prologue chapter has you control The Hero Joshua and his two friends as teenagers, but then skips forward into the future and your friends are replaced by Joshua's new criminal buddies.

Wild ARMs 3 started off with the cast going on individual flashback missions, each one showing how they ended up on the train they were riding. Eventually they all teamed up and the game started for real.

The Wild ARMs series tends to open like this quite frequently, introducing us to the characters in separate missions before they all meet up. You can usually choose the order in which you do this, as well. It's part of the series' emphasis on an ensemble cast, rather than one obvious main character and their group of sidekicks.

The developers do know it's annoying, though, and use it to their plot advantage — Joshua initially fights like he has the survival instincts of a lemming as well as lacking any gear, making his assholish behaviour even more aggravating. This ends up making sense, because he's The Man Behind the Man.

The first Xenosaga pulled this on the player a few times, with the only difference being that the item pool and money carried over between parties until all three groups meet up.

Happens multiple times in Xenoblade rather briefly. Though you can always change who the party's leader is, you're forced into using a particular character or group of characters during these moments, which often don't even require you to fight anything.

Assassin's Creed III has you play the first three memory sequences (about a fifth of the game) as Haytham Kenway, the main protagonist's father. While Haytham can acquire money and equipment in these sequences, none of it carries over to when you start playing as Connor — but oddly, any exploration or sidequests that Haytham accomplished do. Connor can get the money Haytham had, however, if the player is able to find the Green Dragon Inn (Haytham's base of sorts during his sequences) and picks the lock on the chest inside.

Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty has quite possibly the most famous example of this. After about an hour and a half of teasing the player with Solid Snake, he was replaced with Raiden, a completely new character who had never been seen in the series before. The storyline shifted, too, from a band of Russian extremists taking over a Tanker to a loony renegade unit taking over an offshore cleaning facility, two years later. All the player's weapons and items were gone, and if they'd spent time Level Grinding their Grip Gauge it was reset to Level 1.

Its sequel, Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater, jokes with this: If the player chooses MGS2 as his favourite of the franchise when starting a game, the player characters starts the game wearing the Raiden mask...which he soon discards after the first cutscene.

Though played straight in the now-defunct multiplayer component, Metal Gear Online. Depending on the team, if allowed, and who is leading/falling, you can take control as either Ocelot (who has superior CQC abilities and can start with the SAA), Raikov (who has a unique CQC move and is somewhat faster), or Sokolov (who is weaker but starts with active camo). In Sneaking mission, the one player can control Snake who has superior health, CQC, and overall abilities.

Continued in the now-defunct Metal Gear Online on PS3. Sneaking Mission gives you Old Snake, who is considerably weaker compared to Snake from MGO on PS2, but has the same stealth abilities he had in Metal Gear Solid 4 and performs better than regular soldiers, with a partner (if there are 11 players in the room) taking control as Otacon who can distract or stun soldiers, and deliver dog tags to Snake. DLC included the ability to play as Meryl (can start with a scoped D.Eagle), Johnny (XM8 Compact/Anti-Tank rifle, no nano machines), Mei Ling (can call air strikes and can use a sonar device), Liquid Ocelot (manipulate nanomachines, superior CQC and can use the Thor), Raiden (use the sword and is fast), and Vamp (can respawn on the spot and is great with knives), with Snake being allowed to be used in regular matches.

In Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker, you have the option to play as any of the regular soldiers you recruited, provided you are not restricted from using them in a particular stage (such as if you haven't finished a level you want to play on the first time already).

Clock Tower starts you out as Professor Barton, an Exposition Dropping Character who decides your player character and a few other quirks about the game depending on what you have him do. Then you either control Jennifer Simpson or Helen Maxwell for most of the game. In each of their chapters you'll also control either Stan Gotts or Nolan Campbell for a while.

In Deadly Premonition, after playing through most of the story as York, some sections near the end have you taking control of Emily, Zach, and the Original Raincoat Killer.

Eternal Darkness can feel like this if you play the game without having been spoiled of the plot beforehand. As a rule, it's best not to get too attached to the characters you get stuck with. Fortunately, there's no Level Grinding, and once each character finds the Tome, they have all the spells learned up to that point.

In the first Fatal Frame game, you play the tutorial level as Mafuyu, then switch to his sister Miku for the rest of the game.

Fear Effect has the games regularly switch between all available characters at such a rapid pace you can struggle to acclimatize yourself to them.

Resident Evil has you take control of Rebecca in Chris' scenario if Chris gets poisoned by the giant snake. Depending on your interactions with Rebecca, she'll also show up again to make a chemical compound so she can save Chris from a giant mutant plant.

Resident Evil 2 had short segments where you switched control to Ada (Leon's scenario) or Sherry (Claire's scenario).

Resident Evil 3: Nemesis with Carlos, who had the longest character switch in the series, complete with his own area to explore and an optional boss fight.

Resident Evil – Code: Veronica does this, but a bit differently than usual. After playing through most of the first half with Claire, she gets captured by Alexia, forcing the player to take control of Chris to rescue her. Any item left on the storage box can be retrieved by Chris, but items that were carried by Claire before the character switch cannot be used by Chris until the game switches back to her for a brief portion near the end. There is also a brief segment where the player takes control of Steve Burnside, testing out his sub machine guns.

Resident Evil 0 automatically switches to the other character when one ends up in distress.

Resident Evil: Revelations 2 does the same as Revelations where you play past and current events, only instead you can actually switch between characters.

Resident Evil 7: biohazard features a completely new protagonist, named Ethan Winters, as oppose to the series' main gang. This ultimately makes sense, as the game inverts the Actionized Sequel trope that had been in effect since Resident Evil 4, and all the previous protagonists have taken pretty large levels of badass beyond that point. You can also switch to other characters in the playable VHS tapes, including cameraman Clancy and Ethan's wife Mia. Near the end of the game you are forced to play as Mia for the ship section when Ethan is captured and Mia attempts to save him.

The DLC adds two more playable characters: Joe Baker and Chris Redfield.

All three games of the Siren series, have you hop from one character to the next constantly, also hopping backwards or forwards in the game's timeline. Unfortunately, when you return to the same character you'll often find that no matter how what weapons or ammo you finished their earlier level with, they start off the next level with less.

In The Crooked Man, you briefly play as David's best friend Paul, and have to save David from Demonic Possession by the Crooked Man. After that's all over you resume playing as David.

In Ib, under some very special circumstances, you can play as Mary. If you're playing as Mary, you're screwed. You are stuck on the path for the worst ending of the game; you've already lost Ib and Garry, and it's only a matter of time for Mary.

If your character dies in ZombiU, he/she gets replaced with a totally different character. You are also forced to start from the safe house and encouraged to reclaim that character's backpack, zombie or not.

In Bevel's Painting, you typically play as the titular character, Bevel, but in the best ending, you can play as her other self. Subverted in the worst ending, in which you look like the other Bevel, but you still have everything in your inventory.

Until Dawn switches back and forth between eight characters for you to control.

In the very middle of the story in Alien: Isolation, you briefly play as Marlow, as he tells Amanda how his wife came to be infected with the alien.

Third-Person Shooter

The 24 game mainly switches out gameplay perspectives behind Jack Bauer, Tony Almeida, and Chase Edmunds. During one section where CTU is taken over early on, the player also controls Michelle Dessler and then Kim Bauer as they try to survive.

007: From Russia with Love for the PS2 and GC has an interesting variant. For the second mission you're controlling a notably silent Bond while infiltrating an enemy fortress. Then he gets killed and it's revealed that the "Bond" you were playing as this whole time is actually a fake in a mask; you then switch over to the real Bond in England for the rest of the level. Anyone who's seen the movie probably will see this switch coming.

A much more straight use occurs in Tomorrow Never Dies, which has you controlling Bond Girl Wai Lin in the penultimate level rather than Bond himself.

Halo 3: ODST. The game starts off as the player controls The Rookie, the newest member of the ODST squad. During the atmospheric drop into the city, a subspace rupture damages your pod and scatters your team across the city. You awake hours later in the middle of the night all alone. The Rookie spends the game exploring the ruined city finding clues as to what happened to his squad while he was unconscious. Everytime a clue is located, the game shifts to the player controlling a different member of the squad. By the end of the game the player will have controlled every member of the squad during their individual mission segments which come together to form the game's ending after the squad is reunited.

In Max Payne 2, two levels are played from the perspective of Mona Sax.

MDK 2 - There are three protagonists, all of them with different gameplay. You can choose who you play as in the last level.

Red Dead Redemption: After John is murdered by Edgar Ross at the end, the game features a Playable Epilogue that takes place years later where the player takes control over his now grown-up son Jack, looking to avenge his father's death.

In Gears of War 3 the character each player controls changes depending on who is along for this part of the story with about 8 total playable. Player 1 is always series Protagonist Marcus Fenix with the exception of part of chapter 1 where they control Augustus Cole.

Gears Of War Judgement most of the game is framed as a flashback, each chapter being from a different characters perspective. As such the character being controlled changes each chapter to the one narrating the story.

The Aftermath chapter of Judgement is set during the events of the third game and features Clayton Carmine in place of Judgements Sophia.

Done three times in Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney: Trials & Tribulations: in Cases 1 and 4, you do a flash-back to early cases of Phoenix's mentor, Mia Fey, and naturally play as her. In case 5 of the same game, Phoenix suffers a nasty accident and convinces Miles Edgeworth to briefly take his place as a defense attorney. In Justice For All, you very briefly play as Maya as well.

Also done in Apollo Justice: Ace Attorney, where you end up playing as Phoenix in his last trial. After that you play as Thalassa Gramarye playing out Phoenix's seven year investigation through the MASON system

Dual Destinies splits up the cases among Phoenix, Apollo, and new character Athena Cykes, giving each of them the chance to be the viewpoint character.

Case 3 of Prosecutor's Path has the player switching back and forth between Miles Edgeworth investigating a poisoning in 2019 and his father Gregory Edgeworth investigating a related murder in 2000. Case 2 also has a brief moment where you play as Gumshoe.

In Akatsuki No Goei's fandisk, all the heroines have afterstories. Except Reika, however, because in place of an afterstory we instead get a side story from the perspective of Kaito's "friend" Tominori. He has to beg Kaito to let him be the protagonist though.

Corpse Party has this in each Chapter. Chapter 1 has you control Naomi (with Seiko). In Chapter 2, you briefly control Yui-sensei before shifting to Yoshiki (with Ayumi). In Chapter 3, you control Satoshi, then Yuka when the two end up separating. In Chapter 4, you control Ayumi and Satoshi. Finally, in Chapter 5, you can switch control between Ayumi and Satoshi (and briefly control Yuka when she needs to escape from Kizami) in order to meet the requirements to escape.

Chapter 4 of Super Dangan Ronpa 2 has a segment where you play as Nagito Komaeda, investigating an area inaccessable to the normal player character Hajime Hinata.

New Dangan Ronpa V3: The game pulls this during the first Class Trial, switching the player's control to Shuuichi Saihara, when it's revealed that the case's murderer is Kaede Akamatsu, the original player character. In the final trial, after Shuichi temporarily crosses the Despair Event Horizon, K1-B0 gets several playable segments, and the final rally gives Himiko and Maki a playable argument each.

This trope is the whole point of Disgaea Infinite, in which you play a Prinny who can jump into control of various classic Disgaea characters and turn back time, in order to replay events from different perspectives and solve a mystery.

The intro of Fate/stay night is narrated by Rin Tohsaka, one of the game's major characters and a potential love interest for the actual protagonist, Shirou, who narrates the rest of it.

The Bad Boys Love route of Hatoful Boyfriend begins with the human girl getting killed. For the remainder of that route, you play as Ryouta. The protagonist-shift goes hand-in-hand with a Genre Shift from a weird dating sim to a weird murder mystery thriller.

In the second game there are much more nonchalant POV switches to Yuuya and Nageki as they do things out of the protagonist's sight in the last chapter.

Each of The Letter's seven chapters focus on a different character who has read the titular letter.

Downplayed in Morenatsu, where POV switches to another character for brief moments. The most notable instance is the denouement of Kouya's route where the POV shifts to Kouya when he visits his father after the big concert and begins the process of reconciling with his estranged family. while the player character waits outside.

This is one of its main selling points; the game has a total of three protagonists that you can switch between at the press of a button. In shootouts where at least two of them are fighting alongside each other, this switching mechanic often becomes necessary to prevent the demise of whoever you aren't currently playing as.

You spend the first few hours of the game switching between Franklin and Michael, up until the aftermath of the first Heist Mission, at which point the game forcibly switches you to Trevor, and the Switch ability is locked out for several missions while Franklin and Michael lay low.

After Trevor and Michael kidnap Patricia Madrazo, you are briefly locked in as Franklin while the other two lay low in the desert.

Non-Video-Game Examples:

Anime

Tales of Zestiria The X is an anime based on, as one might expect, the video game Tales of Zestiria, albeit with some somewhat major alterations to the plot in places, most likely both to provide a fresh experience and to fit the television format. For two episodes, however in the first season, it breaks from Tales of Zestiria to give viewers the plot and characters of the game's prequel, Tales of Berseria. After these, Berseria is dropped, though the game's main protagonist, Velvet Crowe, is still seen briefly in the intro sequence for the anime's second season.

Comic Books

In Holy Terror, right after The Fixer and Natalie Stack are hit with the first nail bomb, there's a cut to 10 minutes ago where the bomber, an exchange student named Amina, detonates herself and kills several people at a party and causes said explosion.

In chapter 2 of The Great and Powerful Ace Attorney, when Trixie finds herself unable to defend Princess Twilight, Sonata takes her place. Halfway through the following day in the courtroom, Trixie takes over the defense again, her explanation being that while Trixie wants nothing more than to put Twilight in her place, only Trixie should be able to do that.

This is quite common in the Reading Rainbowverse, to the point where brief cameos can evolve into full on cohosts.

The One I Love Is: Most of the story is told from Shinji's point of view, but some scenes and most of side-stories narrate events from other characters' points of view to flesh the plot out.

The Twilight Child: The last two flashback chapters focus on the life and exploits of the main character's cousin, and her gradually evolving relationship with a friend of her cousins, and explains her until-then hinted at fate.

The Second Try: Most of the story follows Shinji and Asuka's point of view, but the bulk of the final chapter "End" shows the events of the second-to-last chapter from Rei's viewpoint.

Persona EG: Most of the story is told from Flash Sentry's perspective, including his narration, but there are a few small scenes that break away from this and show someone else's perspective and narration.

This is most prominent in the LTE version of the story, which includes "bonus scenes" Flash was not present for that follow the perspective of characters like Twilight, Pinkie, Rainbow and Fluttershy.

There is a short interlude chapter for 2/6, which shifts to the perspective of Eris for a brief scene, just as ZIT are discussing her true identity and Flash reveals that Eris is Fluttershy.

The Gemini Hunter Shadow splits itself to attack two targets at once and needs to be fought by two separate teams simultaneously. Flash leads one team to another location to fight the second Gemini while the rest stay behind and are led by Fluttershy.

In the aftermath of Twilight and Flash's breakup and Flash being kicked out of the dorm, there are several short interlude chapters told from Twilight's point of view.

Lone Wolf's star apprentice takes over in Book 21, starting over from relative scratch. And if you don't want to name him, you can use a table to combine two words to give him a supposedly cool name. Or more likely, something absurd like "Sword Shield"note roll a 5 and a 9 for the Kai name prefix and suffix respectively.

The World of Lone Wolf books feature Grey Star the Wizard, a young wunderkind trained in magic by the Shianti, beings so good at magic that the gods had to ask — nicely — for them to leave humanity alone. He's an orphan marooned on the rocks of their island by a storm, and finding him was serendipitous since they are forbidden to leave their island, yet there's this evil sorcerer taking over the world right outside. So they rear him, train him in their ways and send him off to topple an empire.

The Updated Re-release usually has a mini-story at the end with a character tied into the plot. Although there is a reoccuring hero named Dire, a Revenant Zombie that Lone Wolf met in The Captives of Kaag.

The Quest of the Delta Knights episode starts with Pearl and Mike switching places and Pearl riffing on the movie in Mike's stead until the first intermission.

Time Chasers has a subplot about Crow attempting to go back in time and prevent Mike from getting trapped on the Satellite of Love. He succeeds during the 3rd host segment, but this winds up causing Mike to get killed in the new timeline and his Jerkass brother Eddie to replace him. Eddie is the one now riffing on the movie and does so until the next host segment, where Crow restores the timeline and brings Mike back.

Last of the Wild Horses is a Mirror Universe episode, and starts with the alternate universe versions of Dr. Forrester and TV's Frank riffing on the film up until the first intermission, after which things return to our universe and things continue with Mike, Crow, and the misplaced Mirror!Servo.

Literature

In the Alex Cross novel Cat and Mouse by James Patterson, Alex Cross gets knocked unconscious and taken to the hospital. The next chapter starts with, Thomas Pierce a brand new narrator, who was introduced earlier, while we're still reeling from the removal of Cross. And he turns out to be the second serial killer of the book, the same one he investigated.

In Laura Ingalls Wilder's Little House on the Prairie series, book 2, Farmer Boy, switches the focus from the Ingalls to Almanzo Wilder. The Author's name is a bit of a spoiler as to what happens in book 7, Little Town on the Prairie.

Fairly consistently in the Parker novels, the books will spend the third of four sections being told from the perspective of somebody else in the story before reverting back to Parker.

In the Nemesis Saga, the books tend to switch perspectives to various other characters, usually soon-to-be victims of the Kaiju rampage. Occasionally we see the world through the eyes of Nemesis herself.

Very common in Discworld books, as every one has 2-3 main viewpoint characters and occasionally goes into a one off character's POV for a paragraph, sometimes for plot-relevant things, usually for jokes.

The Horatio Hornblower novels are all written from the limited third-person perspective of the title character, an equally innovative, imaginative, and self-doubting individual who is constantly thinking. The only book or short story that isn't is Lieutenant Hornblower, narrated from the perspective of his Lancer, William Bush, and set when they first meet each other with Bush as senior to Hornblower. It's notably free from Hornblower's vivid similes and demonstrates Bush's sturdy, uncomplicated character, but also the fact that he's often able to see his friend's qualities more clearly. It also allows for the creation of a mystery around a tyrannical captain's fall down the hatchway with Hornblower as a chief suspect.

Due to a long history of No Plot? No Problem!, the concept of a player character never truly gelled in pinball. The result is, more often than not, abrupt and rapid switching between player characters, if there are any player characters at all. For instance, in The Wizard of Oz, you are Dorothy by default, but you switch to the Tin Man, the Scarecrow, the Cowardly Lion, or even a complete outside perspective, or multiple characters at once, depending on which modes are active. The nebulous nature of player characters in pinball is best observed in how the term "player character" does not actually exist in pinball terminology, but rather, the less specific and more abstract term of "role."

Podcast

Critical Hit. The game master loves to pull this on the players, giving them a set of different characters to play every once in awhile before switching back to the main party. The goal is to demonstrate different classes and character types in play

Retsutalk episode 23 features Chip Cheezum and General Ironicus instead of the usual hosts slowbeef and Diabetus. There have been podcasts where either slowbeef or Diabetus were AWOL, leaving the other one to do the podcast with one or several guests, but in this one, neither of them are there.

Tabletop Games

In Mummy: The Curse, one of the Frameworks suggested is that the players switch out between usually playing members of a cult and occasionally playing the mummy that the cult worships.

The Dark Sun setting for Dungeons & Dragons demanded what it called the "character tree," an early form of troupe play. The players had multiple characters and could switch them out between adventures as desired or needed.

The Planescape adventure Dead Gods has a lengthy sequence where the players suddenly have to play through a Flashback with a group of pre-made characters. Dead characters. It's a pretty distant flashback and things didn't go well.

The POV can change at very inappropriate times. At one point, it actually shows the POV of a hat.

There's also The Midnight Crew Intermission. It's a chapter's worth of story, but has nothing to do with Homestuck. Or so you're led to think, anyway.

In Blood Is Mine Chapter 2 opens not to the protagonist of the first chapter, but a completely new character named Fuse. The perspective switches back after he meets, and is infected by, the original protagonist.

Web Original

Brennus: While most of the story's focus is on Basil/Brennus and his True Companions as rookie super heroes, most of the interludes and a few entire arc's have focused on completely new characters in entirely different parts of the world, weaving together into a convoluted and expansiveMyth Arc.

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